


The Beautiful Game

by peevee



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Character Study, Football, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-03-06
Updated: 2012-03-06
Packaged: 2017-11-01 14:04:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,063
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/357666
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/peevee/pseuds/peevee
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Mycroft muses on football.</p><p><i>It was at times like this he felt most kinship with how Sherlock must feel at the start of a case, mind free of anything but the pertinent information. Of course, Sherlock would never watch</i> football <i>(Boring!). He never really had embraced the finer things in life.</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	The Beautiful Game

**Author's Note:**

> This was inspired by a comment from 'lurker_of_note' on one of my other fics, they're an Arsenal fan who wanted to see how Mycroft would celebrate a victory in his own Mycroftian way. It kind of turned into a little Mycroft character study, with not so much of the actual celebrating (although I like to think he gives himself his own little reward, at the end!). Hope you like it anyway!

Mycroft Holmes didn’t own a television in his home. He spent so much of his day looking at blasted television screens that watching one at home (aside from being _vulgar_ ) would have felt far too much like work. He also did not frequent pubs, or bars, or any other public setting in which one might watch television alongside the beer drinking, bellowing masses. 

For Mycroft, the only way to watch The Beautiful Game was in the flesh, and one of the many little luxuries he allowed himself was scheduling things so he was always able to attend The Emirates (and how he missed the elegance of Highbury) when Arsenal were playing out some particularly gripping drama. He almost certainly could have scheduled their matches to suit him, but he always had found overt displays of influence rather crude. Not to mention the effort it would require.

He was, of course, the holder of a Diamond Club membership, and although he found the lounge somewhat tacky it was certainly preferable to milling in the lower bar, or perching on an uncomfortable plastic chair for the duration. The food was palatable, in any case. He had enjoyed a light lunch and was ensconced in an armchair with a prime view of proceedings on the pitch.

Comfortably settled with glass of Laphroaig in hand and expression at his most unapproachable (members of the Diamond Club always felt the tiresome need to converse, as if they were here to _network_ ), he waited patiently for the dramatis personæ to stream onto the stage. 

He watched, keen-eyed as they trotted from the tunnel; Szczesny (blister on one of the toes of his left foot, probably the second – moderately painful), Sagna, Vermaelen (unfaithful to his partner, female, wants to stay in the relationship), Koscielny (small contact burn on left thumb), Gibbs (ingested hallucinogenic drugs sometime in the previous 48 hours), Rosicky, Arteta, Walcott (had sexual intercourse this morning, female, not in long term relationship), Song (suffering mild cramp in left shoulder), Benayoun, Van Persie. He could see immediately where the weakest links were, reviewed inwardly who would be suitable substitutes were he himself managing the line-up. Jenkinson for Gibbs, perhaps. 

One of the things Mycroft most enjoyed about watching football was the sheer unpredictability of it compared to many other aspects of his life. He was not, despite what Sherlock liked to say, actually omniscient. He merely _observed_ what others simply saw, made connections between _everything_ the way Sherlock made connections in forensics. He absorbed information, seeing instantly how everything worked as a beautiful whole. While others saw only cogs, he saw the machine. Traffic was, actually, part of his jurisdiction, just as practically everything was part of his jurisdiction. It was the work of seconds for Mycroft to calculate how or if a minor diversion near Holloway Road might affect proceedings in hundreds of other possible areas of the government, and it did not usually even require much effort. His brain just worked in that particular way. 

With football, he could draw in as much information as there was to draw in, calculate the precise trajectory of the ball as it struck a mud-covered boot, consider how a player might be affected by the amount of alcohol he had consumed two nights previously, but there was _something_ , an indefinable element, that caused things to happen in a way Mycroft found difficult to predict. The atmosphere of the crowd changed match to match, impacting on the behaviour of the players, the mood of the manager, and he found footballers to be so delightfully impulsive. It was rather more like watching a stage than a pitch, seeing the characters dance around each other, acting out their roles in ways that were both predictable to their character and unpredictable in that until they had done something he could not have said precisely what it was they were going to do. 

He mentally surveyed the Liverpool first team, weighing up their strengths and weaknesses in comparison to Arsenal, where they were most vulnerable. As he did so, he felt himself beginning to relax into the game. It wasn’t that his mind stopped working, or that he stopped thinking, it was more that everything else was…pushed back. Compartmented, so that he could absorb completely on what was happening on the pitch. His mind quieted, and he felt an ease of tension that only came with this kind of passive focus. Had anyone approached him, he would in all probability have completely ignored them. 

It was at times like this he felt most kinship with how Sherlock must feel at the start of a case, mind free of anything but the pertinent information. Of course, Sherlock would never watch _football_ (Boring!). He never really had embraced the finer things in life. 

It was a rare day that he saw everything slide into perfect place with Arsenal, and those days were the most beautiful to watch. In his more floridly poetic moments he inwardly likened it to a pride of lions bringing down prey; co-ordinated, swift and deadly. They cut through the Liverpool defence with ease, slapping on-target shot after on-target shot towards the goalkeeper, weaving round the midfield with the grace of dancers. He was pleased to see they were playing generally above board as well, for though he had no objection to the odd underhand dive, he found they were usually executed so _badly_ that it wasn’t even worth the effort. It was like a clumsy blow to the head by a killer used to fine, subtle knifework. Obvious and inelegant.

Finally, at full time, the score stood at four to nil. It could have been more, Mycroft mused, if the substitutes he had considered had actually been made, but no matter. He felt more refreshed than if he’d had a twelve-hour sleep, and once the majority of the occupants of the suite had gone, he rose and made his way unhurriedly down to the waiting car. 

“Good game, sir.” It wasn’t a question, his assistant betraying herself with a slight upward twitch of the lips. She always liked days the Arsenal emerged victorious.

He hummed agreement, slid smoothly into the back seat and checked his pocket watch; still on perfect schedule for his five o’clock meeting. Excellent. Then, perhaps, he would visit Sherlock. He felt particularly well equipped for it, this afternoon.

**Author's Note:**

> If anyone was interested, Laphroaig is a very peaty whisky from the Island of Islay off the west coast of Scotland, and it's pronounced "la-froyg". It's also delicious.


End file.
